TORONTO — Joe Girardi’s slumped posture and face that housed a blank stare did a better job of describing the Yankees’ fate Sunday than anything else could have.

As the manager of a team whose October dreams are fading quickly, Girardi waited for the television camera to be turned on as he sat behind a desk inside Rogers Centre.

There were no numbers or letters printed on Girardi’s mug, but the bitter 4-3 loss to the Blue Jays in front of 45,678 was all over it.

“We have a real important homestand coming up,’’ Girardi said as the Yankees remained 3 ¹/₂ games out of the second wild-card spot. “We have nine games and we have to win a lot of them.’’

Through five innings Sunday, Girardi had to feel good. His club was leading, 3-0, and Brandon McCarthy, the ace of the rebuilt rotation, was cruising through the muscular Blue Jays’ lineup.
The Yankees were four innings away from a 4-3 road trip and in no danger of losing ground in the AL East race, which is just about over, and the chase for the second wild-card ticket.

The positive vibe in the Yankees’ dugout turned in the sixth when Melky Cabrera and Jose Bautista crushed back-to-back solo homers with two outs in the sixth.

And the vibe vanished completely in the seventh when Edwin Encarnacion, who McCarthy and the other Yankees believed had struck out on a 2-2 pitch that was called a ball, smoked a 3-2 pitch over the left-field wall.

“It was right down the middle of the plate,’’ McCarthy said of the 2-2 pitch umpire Chad Fairchild called a ball. “The next pitch was a terrible pitch.’’

Perhaps shook up by not getting the call, McCarthy walked Dioner Navarro on four pitches. Girardi decided it was time for Dellin Betances, and as McCarthy walked off the mound he gestured with his hands where the thought the critical pitch to Encarnacion was.

“It was a pitch you want to have,’’ McCarthy said.

Betances struck out Colby Rasmus and Danny Valencia, but gave up a groundball single to Munenori Kawasaki to right that scored pinch-runner Scott Tolleson, who had stolen second.

The Yankees threatened in the ninth against Casey Janssen when Jacoby Ellsbury delivered a pinch-hit bloop double to right with one out. But Brett Gardner, who went 3-for-5 with a homer, double and triple, grounded out to the right side and Derek Jeter hit a soft liner to Tolleson at second to end the game.

“It’s a fun situation, you want to be in that situation,’’ said Jeter, who went 1-for-5 and is in an 8-for-44 (.182) funk. “You try to get a hit like always. He was better than me this time. We had opportunities until the end.’’

Still, the Yankees only had one hit in eight at-bats with runners in scoring position — Francisco Cervelli’s two-out, RBI single in the fourth.

“It makes it a little harder if you don’t hit the ball out of the ballpark,’’ Girardi said of his lineup, which batted .227 (5-for-22) in the clutch across the past four games.

The loss combined with the AL East-leading Orioles victory over the Twins dropped the Yankees nine games back and with 27 games remaining the focus has to turn to the second wild-card spot.